Aubrey Reed
Aubrey Mae Reed (née Aubrey Harrinton, February 23, 1981) (Legally Aubrey Harrinton in Québec) is a Canadian-American trap and skeet shooter, former member of the Canadian Royal Mounted Police, and First Lady of the United States. She is married to President Calvin Reed, and is the first Canadian-born First Lady, as well as the first First Lady born outside of the United States since its founding. Born in Québec, but raised by an often-moving family in various locations throughout Canada, Reed would follow her father's footsteps and enlist in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police after graduating from the Université Laval with an Associate's Degree in Criminal Justice. Reed would spend a fourteen-year career with the RCMP while competing for Team Canada internationally in trap, and later both trap and skeet shooting. She has medalled in four separate Olympics, and set the world record for final score in womens' trap and skeet in 2012. Reed would meet her husband in 2010, at a Toronto Blue Jays baseball game. Calvin and Aubrey married in 2013, and have three daughters. Reed campaigned for her husband's Presidential bid in 2016, eliciting some controversy for her active role, and delivered an address at the 2016 Republican National Convention. Reed has indicated in an interview that she intends to focus primarily on gun safety and physical health as First Lady. Her commentary on LGBT and firearms issues have elicited mixed praise and controversy during her time in office. Early Life and Education Aubrey Mae Harrinton was born in Québec City, Québec on February 23, 1981. As the daughter of two uniformed officers, Gen. Amy Lefèbvre of the Canadian Army, and Staff. Sergeant Justin Harrinton of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the young Harrinton was often forced to move with changing deployments or assignments for one or either parent, including occasional stints in which conflicting postings or responsibilities required her to live with only one parent. The changes in location required changes in schools, and Harrinton would attend a variety of public schools throughout her childhood, rarely settling down at a single institution for an extended period of time leaving a confused record that ultimately, in error, placed her a grade ahead of where she was intended, a mistake Harrinton was unaware of, though a partial cause of struggles she often faced in her schooling, rarely scoring high marks. Harrinton's parents married late in life, and with Aubrey their firstborn, did not conceive again, leaving her an only child. Harrinton's mother came from a long French line in Québec, dating back to the King's Daughters and born in Gaspé, while her father was of mixed First Nations blood, hailing from Nunavik. It was her mother's nationalism and patriotism to her homeland and ancestry, despite her mixed marriage, that rubbed off most on the young Harrinton. Born Québécoise and considering herself such, Harrinton was raised in a bilingual household, her parents speaking to each other and her in both English and Québec French, both of which she speaks fluently. Harrinton would further learn Inuktitut from her father. Both of Harrinton's parents were strict and authoritative in raising their daughter, with rules and expectations, both familial and religious, clearly set, and expected to be followed. Harrinton, large for her age and sex, displayed interest and prowess in physical activity, as well as the outdoors, in her youth. Despite her young age, her father would occasionally take Harrinton with him to work, either in the office, or on ridealongs, particularly wilderness assignments. At some point in Harrinton's childhood, she would be signed up for an ice hockey team by her father, despite her expressed dislike of skating on ice. Harrinton would knock out another player in her first game, and was disinvited from the team. After her mother reached the mandatory retirement age for the Canadian Army, the family's living situation would stabilize somewhat, her father requesting and receiving a posting in Québec, and Harrinton and her parents taking up a more permanent lodging. Harrinton took advantage of the opportunity to join the Royal Canadian Army Cadets, and would work her way through the program ranks. Harrinton would take advantage of almost all physical or wilderness opportunities available, but took especial interest in biathlon and marksmanship training with the Cadets' rifles, participating in summer training opportunities whenever they became available. Completing advanced training courses with alacrity, Harrinton would qualify for the National Rifle Team, traveling for the first time internationally, across the Atlantic Ocean to the National Shooting Center in Bisley, England along with other top Cadets, scoring highest marks among the entire RCAC organization. Harrinton would be promoted to Cadet Adjudant-chef before graduating from the program. Upon her graduation from high school, Harrinton considered two career paths, in line with those of her parents. She had the opportunity to either follow her mother's path and join the Canadian Armed Forces, or her father's route, to join the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Harrinton would ultimately make the decision to follow the career path of her father, but, at seventeen, was below the minimum age to apply. With a period of empty years before her, Harrinton would apply for, and attend, the Université Laval as she waited to meet the age requirement for enlistment in the RCMP. Earning an Associate's Degree in Criminal Justice, Harrinton then joined the RCMP in 2000 once of age, moving to attend the RCMP Academy is Saskatchewan. Career Harrinton functioned well in the demanding, military-style six month program of the academy as she had with the Cadets, excelling in physical tests and marksmanship. Harrinton served with distinction as a member of the RCMP for the next several years, following directly in her father's footsteps. Harrinton preferred, and would consistently volunteer for, "wilderness" assignments, working to stop poachers and perform winter rescues in the more barren expanses, often operating independently, and at a distance from other RCMP members. As most officers, however, Harrinton would shift between various duties of the years of her career. Harrinton's marksmanship was well-regarded as a member of the RCMP. Early in her career, her skill with a firearm was made apparent when Harrinton brought down a hostile in a potential fortress situation with a shotgun slug at range. Commended for her handling of the situation, she would be tapped late that year for the International Police Pistol Competition, an annual competition between the RCMP and Alaskan State Troopers. Harrinton would post an exemplary performance, attaining the highest score in the completion, but considered her true skill as a marksman to be with a shotgun. A friend of Harrinton's referred her to the Canadian Olympic Committee. Trying out for the committee, she would successfully make the team. Later Career Harrinton's first Olympic Games were the 2004 games in Athens, Greece, her first trip overseas, which she said "floored" her. Harrinton's future husband, Calvin Reed, would attend the games as well, for the United States baseball team, but the pair did not meet. Harrinton would participate in double trap during the games, joining veteran Canadian teammate Susan Nattrass, who had been granted an exception to the one-shooter-per-nation rule with a redistributed quota slot, but finished last among the fifteen competitors after an Olympics-worst 25/40 final set, ending a full nine shots behind the fourteenth-place finisher. Harrinton, by contrast, led the field in the qualifying round decisively, shooting 39-39-40 to set a world record score of 118 in qualifying, entering the final set with an eight-shot lead over American Kim Rhode and South Korean Lee Bo-Na, the largest lead in the discipline's three-Olympics history, and needing to strike only thirty-three of the next forty clays to secure a victory. Harrinton performed well through the first two-thirds of shots, but began to struggle late, losing her aim to ultimately miss her last six consecutive clays to give her a score of twenty-eight in the final, lowest in the field. A thirty-six score from Rhode was the highest in the final, and brought her into a tie with Harrinton, leading to a shoot-off for the gold medal. Harrinton managed to strike one clay in the first set of the shoot-off, but Rhode struck both, winning her gold, and leaving Harrinton with silver after the collapse. Harrinton would later say "I choked" in reference to the finish, and called it "some of the worst shooting of my life. Harrinton would continue to serve with the RCMP throughout her shooting career, as well as in the four-year interim period before the Beijing Olympics, participating in world championships, and representing the organization. Transitioning to single trap after the elimination of double trap for women by the IOC, Harrinton participated in the 2006 World Shooting Championships in Zagreb, out-shooting fellow Canadian Susan Nattrass for the gold. Harrinton would win her second gold at the 2007 World Shotgun Championships, defeating Liu Yingzi and Deborah Gelisio. At the Pan-American games that summer, Harrinton would once again edge out fellow countrywoman and team Canada flag-bearer Susan Nattrass for a first-place finish. Harrinton would compete in her second Olympics at Beijing in 2008, once again alongside Nattrass. Neither of Harrinton's opponents from the 2007 championship would succeed in qualifying for the final round, and Harrinton very nearly failed to do so herself. A score of sixty-seven clays off of 21-22-24 shooting tied her for sixth place with Japanese shooter Yukie Nakayama, with Harrinton winning a shoot-off to advance to the final at a three-shot deficit. Harrinton led the field with twenty-three clays in the final round, but the performance was not enough to catch up to leader Satu Mäkelä-Nummela's twenty-one round final, giving the Finnish woman gold over Harrinton by a one shot margin. Harrinton would later comment that the Beijing Olympics were her favorite to have competed in, commenting that it was "really something to see, somewhere to be." Harrinton would continue to achieve success among the weaker competition at the World Championships and Pan-American Games in the years after her near-miss at Beijing. Continuing to serve with the RCMP, Harrinton's role was necessarily reduced by her secondary duties in times of competitions, though she continued to serve full-time. Her position as an Olympic-level athlete in shooting sports was seen as an effective advertisement for recruitment into the RCMP, and Harrinton would agree for limited work, and the use of her likeness, in recruitment efforts. Still seeking her first Olympic gold medal, Harrinton began to participate in womens' skeet as well as trap, qualifying in both for the 2012 London games, the sole Canadian athlete, male or female, to participate in either discipline for the first time in her Olympic career. The London games would prove a breakthrough for Harrinton, and both events would be commented on as some of the most exciting in Olympic history. In qualifying for skeet, Harrinton and four-time medalist Kim Rhode, the victor in the shoot-off for gold over Harrinton in double-trap at Athens, traded shot for shot in qualifying, both set to easily smash the Olympic record, and Harrinton tying Rhode's own world record with seventy-five of seventy-five clays, taking a one-shot lead over Rhode after the American missed one shot in her final round. The two competitors would both prove flawless in the final round, with twenty-five of twenty-five clays each, Harrinton's one-shot advantage in qualifying granting her the gold by a one-shot margin, and the new world record. The following week in trap, Harrinton would go toe-for-toe in another heated competition, this time against Italian Jessica Rossi. Both women took joint possession of the new world record in the qualifying round with seventy-five clays apiece, in an event where all six of the qualifiers for the final broke or tied the former Olympic record. In the final twenty-five clays, Harrinton and Rossi would soon separate themselves from the pack with hit after hit, but a single miss from Rossi would prove the margin, as Harrinton took the gold, and the world record, again by only one shot. Harrinton would spark some controversy in comments after the 2012 Games on the issue of Québec sovereignty. When asked by a reporter how it felt to be the first woman to win a gold in shotgun for Canada, Harrinton replied that she was the first woman to win gold for Québec. Harrinton was reportedly privately reprimanded for the statement. Harrinton would officially retire from the RCMP the following year, citing her pending engagement to Reed, and would move to the United States. States. She was offered, but refused, a liaison officer position, choosing instead full retirement after fourteen years of service. Philanthropy and Politics Following her from the RCMP, and marriage to Cal Reed, Aubrey Harrinton, now Aubrey Reed, involved herself somewhat in American Dream, her husband's charity organization. Her primary accomplishment with the organization was working to establish a sister charity to operate in Canada, under the name True Opportunity, with Reed being the primary liaison to complete the international attempt. Harrinton would continue her shooting career alongside her husband's MLB career, continuing her success in sub-Olympic competition. In late 2014, the Canadian Olympic Committee would announce a partnership with Egale Canada and You Can Play in introducing LGBT issues as part of its mandate, the first country to do so. Reed would criticize the development, disapproving of what she would state to be the interference of politics into sports. Upon the announcement of her husband's campaign for the 2016 Republican nomination, Reed became actively involved in the race. To publicity, and some controversy, Reed campaigned on the trail to a abnormal extent, holding fully independent rallies on her own topics. It is believed to be these events that led to the situation of Secretary Garestaer attempting to use child protective services in an attempt to kidnap the Reeds' daughter. Reed was less active on the campaign trail after that incident. Later in the campaign, at an event in Idaho, a rally from Mr. Reed had a breakdown of security, with two men attacking the candidate, alongside a nude woman partially covered in Sen. Carrollton campaign stickers. Reed gained some notoriety, and online fame for coming from backstage and knocking out the interloper. The event humorously would be named the "Play of the Week" on SportsCenter. Reed spoke on the final day of the 2016 Republican National Convention, in a generally well-received address. Despite having given birth to twins by Caesarian section less than three weeks prior, Reed would travel with her husband to Rio de Janeiro for the 2016 Summer Olympics. Competing in women's trap and skeet once again, the sole Canadian to qualify in either. Reed would match her 2012 score in qualifying for trap, and win gold with a 16-for-16 final round under the new rules, while matching her performance in skeet, taking home two gold medals. Reed's 2016 victories would tie her for the most medals earned by a Canadian athlete (6), and most gold medals by a Canadian athlete (4). First-Lady Designate Calvin Reed would be elected President of the United States in a landslide victory on November 8, 2016, making Aubrey Reed the First Lady-Designate. Reed would appear on the talk show Late Night Tonight, hosted by Scotty Marlowe, for her first public interview of the election. Reed's interview would elicit some controversy, with her answers variously praised and criticized. Reed was generally considered to appear uncomfortable and awkward on-stage by commenters, which was blamed by some on Marlowe's style. Reed would criticize advocates of gun control, calling fear of guns a "cultural craze" and "irrational", while advocating for educating children about firearm safety, and promoting "exposing" children to a firearm for the purpose of that education. Reed would also receive some controversy after responding to a compliment by Marlowe that she seemed like she would be a "great mother" by expressing doubt that a talk-show conversation was enough to discern one's capacity for motherhood. An editorialist at TNS-L would attack Reed as "in bed with the far right" after her comments, referencing her stated support of Constitutional Carry early in the Reed campaign, while criticizing her demeanor. Others would issue statements of support for the First Lady-Designate's comments, with Democratic Governor of Maine Claudia Patton praising Reed's support of gun safety education and the Second Amendment, and Senator-Elect Locklear, (R-AK) criticizing "sexism" against Reed. Reed would be interviewed a second time shortly before the Inauguration, by Curtis Nolan of TNS, once again to controversy. Questioned on the matter of same-sex marriage, Nolan would press the First Lady-Designate on the topic with a series of additional questions, covering a significant plurality of the interview. The interview's public release led to heavy criticism against Nolan, particularly from Republican sources, accusing the interview and interviewer of bias, and lack of professionalism or decorum. Rising outrage would later cause Nolan to be reassigned to an alternate show, with Reed making no comment on the matter after the interview. Following the interview, Democratic Representative Nicole Smith of Illinois criticized Reed for pro-gun statements made during the interview, claiming that the First Lady was advocating for the legalization of fully automatic weapons, and that she was "itching" for a shooter to take one such weapon onto a college campus or bank. While these comments sparked significant controversy, Reed once again made no public response. First Lady Aubrey Reed was officially inaugurated as First Lady of the United States with her husband's taking of the oath of office on January 20, 2017. At the inaugural ball that same night, she would dance with her husband to Nat King Cole's L-O-V-E, wearing a light blue sequined dress, and notably avoiding high heels. Reed sparked controversy while on a diplomatic visit to Saudi Arabia with her husband after electing to wear a hijab when arriving. The decision was criticized by Alabama Senator Alois Kramer, and called 'disgusting' by Wyoming Senate candidate Dianna Noble, and 'regrettable' by Alaska Senator Helena Locklear, though was praised as a "very nice" show of respect by Hawaii Senator Sam McGareth. On July 1, 2017, Reed involved herself in an "Ask Me Anything" reddit thread, answering questions from any users on any topic. Personal Life Harrinton/Reed met her future husband first in Toronto in 2010, where she attended a baseball game at which he was playing. In later interviews, Reed said that she had "never had much of an interest" in baseball, and that she was only attending the game for a friend. The couple became a popular subject with celebrity magazines as they dated, but had a marriage considered an "elopement", in a small, unannounced wedding in Montana in 2013. The engagement of the couple had taken place quietly earlier, allowing Aubrey, legally a foreign alien, to apply for and receive a green card. Reed became pregnant with the couple's first child in 2015, prompting her husband's retirement, but not an interruption of her training. Reed would give birth one month before her due date that December, to a daughter, Mia. Reed would formally become a U.S. citizen in early 2016, successfully passing her citizenship test on her first attempt. Reed currently holds dual citizenship in both the United States and Canada. In June 2016, Reed announced that she was expecting a second child, and, after complications, prematurely gave birth to twin girls on July 20, 2016. Category:Republican Category:Foreign-Born Category:First Lady of the United States Category:Athletes